Many processed cheese and cream cheese manufacturers utilize horizontal pouch forming, filling, and sealing equipment from American National Can Company or Hart Design and Manufacturing. Conventional processes use wax coated film (usually cellophane or PET based) to form pouches that are then filled with a food product such as cheese. After filling, the pouches are closed by over-lapping the film that wraps around the product and sealing the films together in the over-lapped area. Waxed film layers are easily sealed together with heat because of the wax's low melt initiation temperature and its excellent flow and caulking properties. A wax lap seal is usually achieved by the heat of the molten cheese product (typically about 165° F.) alone. However, waxed films are relatively expensive. Moreover, they have a tendency to delaminate when the pouch is opened, so that the wax layer pulls away from the film substrate and sticks to the food surface.
Currently, most horizontal pouch forming equipment, when using non-wax film such as a polymeric film, requires the formation of a “fin seal.” A fin seal has edges of superimposed films bonded to each other, resulting in a pouch having a fin-like protuberance. A fin seal requires a wider film width to make the fin, thus requiring more material per pouch and also tending to require considerably slower line speeds to properly facilitate the sealing of the fin seal. Moreover, a high cost is associated with retrofitting older lap folding equipment to provide for formation of a fin seal.